*A look at some Linux migrations taking place in Germany, Australia and Canada
So, an Aussie, a Canadian and a German guy walk into a bar … and migrate the joint’s computer system to Linux.
It’s not the best joke in the world – or even a joke of any kind at all. But the sentence above does encompass where some interesting Linux desktop and server room migrations are happening around the globe.
In Munich, Germany, the city’s government offices are in the midst of a huge Linux desktop swap-out. The plan is to switch 14,000 PCs from Microsoft Windows to Linux over the next two years. So far, 100 PCs have been loaded with Debian, as well as the KDE desktop and OpenOffice 2.0. Government IT officials say they are in no hurry to turn over every Windows machine, and admit that a total migration is not likely, since some hardware and software products will still require Microsoft. Having 200 PCs migrated by year-end is the goal for now.
In Canada, at Vancouver Community College, the server room has had a large portion of its Windows, and some older Novell NetWare, servers switched over to SuSE Linux Enterprise Server. The college installed IBM blade server hardware running SuSE to take over file, print, Web, database and application hosting duties. Some Windows servers will remain for some vertical applications that are not supported on Linux, school IT officials say. The college is also looking to move its desktop users – around 1,000 total – to Linux as the next step.
Over 7,000 miles away, the government of New South Wales in Australia has made Linux a requirement in an RFP for a new IT contract. While the RFP specified some Microsoft Windows requirements, according to reports, the ability for desktops, laptops and servers to run Linux was listed as “highly desirable.” The infrastructure upgrade could easily involve hundreds of thousands of PCs and tens of thousands of servers.
